The present invention, in some embodiments thereof, relates to melon plants, having small seedless fruit with enhanced fruit yields and methods of generating same.
Parthenocarpy, the production of seedless fruits, can be achieved by the addition of the plant growth regulators auxin, cytokinin or gibberellin in many crops. It has been shown that the exogenous application of auxin or gibberellin to unfertilized flowers in a number of plant species, induces fruit set in the absence of pollination, resulting in the production of parthenocarpic fruit. In previous efforts to produce seedless fruits, traditional plant breeding and exogenous application of hormones have been used with some success. However, the exogenous application of plant hormones is a labor-intensive process, and traditional plant breeding is a long term process. Moreover, at least some of the previous attempts to produce certain seedless fruits have resulted in low numbers of seedless fruits and/or in relatively small seedless fruits as compared with the normal, seeded fruits. In most cases, this led to a significant yield reduction in small fruit varieties.
Cucumis melo exhibits extreme diversity for fruit traits. Melon fruit vary in size, shape, external color, aroma and flesh characters such as sugar content, acidity and pigmentation. Still, there is an increasing demand for new fruit types by modern food markets. In melon, fruit set and number is a trait that is mostly governed at the hormonal level. Fruit set is affected by hormonal talk that results from the success or failure of the previous female flower on the branch to develop a fruit however the general number of fruit per plant is pretty constant. Typically, most melon varieties will produce 1-5 fruit per plant in the field.
There is a long felt need in the art for an effective and economical means and methods for the production of seedless fruit, particularly in good yield and quality as compared with prior art seedless fruits.
Background art includes U.S. Patent Application No. 20120324597 and WO 2011/018785.